The Lesser of Two Evils
by Lunamionny
Summary: The golden trio's precarious escape from Malfoy Manor goes devastatingly wrong and Hermione is left behind. When Voldemort offers Hermione - and her virginity - to Fenrir Greyback as a 'gift', she anxiously thinks up a desperate plan to escape from the foul clutches of the werewolf. But it is a tenuous plan that rests on an unknown, crucial factor: Draco Malfoy. (Angsty Dramione).
1. Chapter 1

**A/N:**

Written for the Unhappily Ever After Fest hosted on tumblr. I claimed the following prompt: 'Draco visits Hermione in the dungeons and eventually sneaks Hermione from the dungeon at Malfoy Manor and helps her escape. He decides to stay with his family.'

Huuuuge love and thanks to my beta, NuclearNik, and alpha IKEAwhatyoudidthere.

WARNINGS: Depictions of torture, imprisonment, dubious consent; References to/threats of rape (but not a depiction of it); Not a happy ending but there is a teeny bit of hope; Smut, sexual content.

* * *

__'Being raised by...the Malfoys...would be a very damaging experience, and Draco undergoes dreadful trials as a direct result of his family's misguided principles. However, the Malfoys do have one saving grace: they love each other. Draco is motivated quite as much by fear of something happening to his parents as to himself.'__ \- J K Rowling, Pottermore, 2015

* * *

Ch. 1 The Mudblood Slut

It happened so quickly, but at the same time seemed to take an age – the boys disappearing. In a black swirl of bodies and a flying dagger, they'd Disapparated and left her.

Just a split second earlier, Hermione had been with them, with Ron clutching onto her tightly. She had been wandless and too weak from Bellatrix's recent torture to Disapparate on her own. But at the last moment, Ron had pushed them out of the way of the careening dagger, lost his footing, and with it, his grip on Hermione. She had been separated from her friends and had landed with a thud on the floor of the drawing room of Malfoy Manor once more.

Hermione realised that she could not move, let alone get to her feet. Her bones still felt like they were shattered from Bellatrix's relentless Crucios, her muscles as if they'd dissolved to nothing, and her skin still burnt as if it were on fire.

Her first reaction was one of relief. They'd gotten away. They were safe. Hopefully__. Surely? __The boys. Her boys.

Then terror seized her. Because since the time the three of them had slotted together into an irrevocable friendship all those years ago after defeating a mountain troll, she hadn't been alone. None of them had. It had always been the three of them – except when Ron had his bout of insecurity, of course. That's how they worked, watching each other's backs and supporting each other. Hermione's brain, Ron's bravery, Harry's fierce determination to do the right thing.

Now she was alone. Utterly alone and wandless. The reality of these two facts made her rigid with fear. Before, when Bellatrix had been raining curses down on her, at least she had known she wasn't alone. She had heard Ron cry her name again and again. His muffled screams had travelled through the floorboards of the drawing room from the cellar below, and his voice had grounded her. As helpless as the boys had been at that point, knowing there were people in the world who were trying to save her had helped Hermione's mind clutch onto sanity and not slip into a chaos of panic.

Now it was just her. And her supposedly bright, brilliant mind. She couldn't lose that. If she lost her mind, she'd have nothing.

__Keep your head Hermione. No matter what the fuck happens, keep your head. __

An ear-piercing shriek cut through the stunned silence, and Bellatrix – in a fit of rage at the boys' escape – swept her wand around the room. The mirror above the ornate fireplace, the champagne flutes in the drinks cabinet, the glass in the framed portraits of the Malfoy ancestors – it all shattered into shards that flew through the air. Hermione lay motionless as numerous glass fragments rained down on her, stinging her with a hundred tiny cuts.

"Crucio!" Bellatrix targeted her wrath and wand – again – at Hermione.

Hermione's back arched involuntarily, her muscles spasmed, and she heard the now familiar sound of her own screams as her blood turned to hot acid in her veins. Her skin felt like it was being peeled off with a thousand razors, and her bones were fracturing apart all over again. Her entire existence was pain and jangling nerves until Bellatrix mercifully ceased the curse.

"Where have they gone?" she demanded.

"I don't know," Hermione managed to croak. Her throat felt like sandpaper.

This time, the statement was true – she genuinely had no idea where the boys would have gone to be safe. Perversely, her ignorance just made her feel more lonely. If she ever did manage to escape, how on earth would she find them again?

Bellatrix yelped in frustration and flicked her wand at Hermione again, making pain tear through her body once more. When it finally stopped, and the agony subsided, Hermione felt dampness and warmth in between her legs as the unmistakable smell of ammonia reached her nostrils. With a burning shame, she realised she had lost control of her bladder.

Bellatrix sneered down at her. "Well, would you look at that! The dirty little bitch has pissed herself! I knew these Mudbloods didn't have any manners, but __really __!"

Bellatrix cackled, and Hermione heard sniggering from elsewhere in the room, probably from the snatchers and Greyback. As she continued to lie on the floor, she tried to focus and take in the figures surrounding her. Lucius and Narcissa stood a few feet beyond Bellatrix, their postures tense, and far back in the shadows of the room, she could see a flash of blond hair which must be Draco.

"Where are they?" Bellatrix cried again, shrill and furious.

"I don't know," Hermione repeated. Her voice was barely audible.

"Well, where have you been hiding yourselves up 'til now?" Bellatrix persisted.

Hermione paused, and Bellatrix raised her wand once more, prompting Hermione to speak.

"All over...the countryside," she managed. Surely disclosing that information wouldn't do any harm. She knew the boys wouldn't be foolish enough to return to a place they had already been. Then a thought struck her: would they come back here to try and rescue her? Her insides twisted. __Surely they wouldn't be reckless enough to do that. __

"You lying piece of Mudblood scum!" Bellatrix exclaimed. "Draco. Come here!"

There was a pause as Draco walked hesitantly towards his aunt.

"Perform Legilimency on her!" Bellatrix commanded once Draco had reached them. "You're the best at it besides me!" She took a deep breath as if to calm herself, before continuing in a chilling voice. "With the state I'm in, I'll break her fucking mind into pieces if I go in there. Then we'd get nothing but nonsense from her!"

Hermione's heart pounded in her ears. They mustn't read her thoughts. They would know then, about the Horcruxes and the sword, and they mustn't – they couldn't. She tried to summon as much strength as possible to push valuable information into the corners of her mind and fleetingly regretted she hadn't ever asked Harry to give her Occlumency lessons.

Draco was looking at his aunt with his jaw clenched, the muscles in his face tight and tense.

"Do it! Now!" Bellatrix urged.

Draco turned, walked stiffly towards Hermione and crouched down by her head. She briefly wondered if eye contact made Legilimency easier, but pride made her look into Draco's eyes regardless – defiant and bold. They hadn't beaten her yet, despite the fact that her body was so broken she couldn't move, despite the fear of what Draco might discover amongst her memories.

Draco's face was unreadable as he lifted his wand and aimed it at her temple, and Hermione made one last-ditch attempt at summoning all her mental strength to push anything that might help the Death Eater cause deep into the recesses of her mind.

"Legilimens," Draco incanted in a surprisingly gentle voice.

Hermione realised immediately that any hope of resisting Draco's spell had been naïve and futile. Bellatrix's torture had rendered her so weak, it was impossible to put up any defence, even if she had been skilled in Occlumency.

Resigned, she gave in to what felt like icy fingers rifling through her brain, haphazardly flicking through memory after memory: Harry shouting at Ron to "leave the locket and go", Hermione asking Xenophilius Lovegood about the Deathly Hallows, her re-reading dog-eared pages of __Beedle the Bard __for the tenth time. There were numerous moments of bickering, boredom and eating meagre meals. Then there was her shrieking at the boys, demanding to know where they had found the sword. And the worst betrayal of all: Hermione explaining enthusiastically to Harry that the sword was impregnated with basilisk's venom, and thus could destroy Horcruxes.

Finally, Draco ceased his assault on her mind. He lowered his wand and gazed at Hermione, his expression unreadable. She had the distinct impression he was thinking something through – she remembered that expression from class when they'd be given a complex arithmancy equation.

"Well?" Bellatrix's eyes were wide and eager, her lips pulling apart, revealing grey teeth.

Draco stood up and faced his aunt. Hermione noticed how his gaze flitted over to Narcissa before he spoke.

"Nothing," Draco stated scathingly. "I found nothing about where the blood traitors would have gone. She was telling the truth – they've been living in the dirt for months. Quite fitting, really, filthy little Dunglickers that they are."

"Urgh! Nothing?" Bellatrix exclaimed in frustration.

Hermione waited. She waited with a twisted stomach – fighting the urge to vomit – for Draco to tell Bellatrix all about the sword being real and that the three of them had been searching for something called 'Horcruxes'.

"Nothing," Draco confirmed.

Confusion grew in Hermione, but she didn't have the mental strength to think through the reasons for Draco's discretion. When she concentrated too hard, it felt like someone was hammering a chisel right through her skull.

"Well, then she's even more useless than I thought. Let's dispose of her before the Dark Lord comes." Bellatrix raised her wand to Hermione once more. "Avada— "

Over recent months, the precarious situation Hermione had been in and the relentless hours of doing nothing had meant that she'd often thought about how she might die.

She had hoped, of course, that the Light would win the war, that she would have many more years to live and to learn. But she had also been aware that she may not have that time – that she might die in one infamous battle, or be caught and killed by Death Eaters. So the current situation she was in was not a horrific shock to her.

Even so, in that split second before Bellatrix finished incanting the Killing Curse, Hermione mourned.

She mourned for the books she wouldn't read, for the theories she wouldn't learn about, for the friends she wouldn't see grow up. She mourned for the loss of not knowing what it would be like to lie with a man, bodies clutched together in love and passion. She thought of the babies she wouldn't feel growing inside her, the children she wouldn't teach Muggle science and magical charms. And most painful of all, Hermione mourned for the parents that would never know they'd had a daughter.

"Wait!" The cry came from Draco.

Bellatrix wand arm wavered, and her eyes flicked to her nephew.

"What?" she snapped impatiently.

"Her knowledge may be useless, but __she __isn't," Draco's voice was measured and full of disdain. "She's Potter's slut. She's important to him. He's likely to come back for her – to try and rescue her. She could be used as bait. Or leverage. I think she's too valuable to be simply disposed of. And at least we'll have something to show the Dark Lord. He's on his way now and will be dissatisfied we've called him at all."

Bellatrix lowered her wand as Draco spoke, a frown creasing her forehead as she thought through her nephew's words.

"Is she, though? A slut, that is?" a new voice said, and Hermione saw Greyback move forward, scuttling like an animal across the drawing room.

Draco and Bellatrix watched as Greyback crouched down beside Hermione, leaning in towards her and sniffing at her neck, bearing yellow teeth. She felt bile rise in her throat as she breathed in the scent of stale sweat and dirt, the werewolf's greasy hair inches from her face. To her confusion and horror, Greyback moved his head down her body, pulling in long, heavy breaths – s__niffing __her – and finished by placing his head at her crotch and breathing in one long inhalation.

He finally raised his head, smiling at her cruelly. "She's no slut. She's not been touched. She's pure – I can smell it." Hermione felt his hand cupping her right between her legs. "You've not let any boys near here, 'ave you? You've been a good girl," he purred.

Hermione's stomach contents abruptly rose to her throat and lest she choke, she had no choice but to open her mouth and vomit, splattering her front and the floorboards next to her.

Bellatrix sighed as if exasperated. "The stupid little cunt is making even more of a mess of your drawing room, Narcissa."

Greyback chuckled and continued to press his hand into Hermione's sex. He didn't move it, but the gesture was invasive enough; one of power and possession.

"I want her," Greyback said, keeping his eyes locked on Hermione. "If we're keeping her, let me 'ave her. I found her."

"Really? You want such filth? Covered in her own piss and blood and vomit?" Bellatrix asked, incredulous but amused at the same time.

"I think she could scrub up rather nicely," Greyback retorted.

As with the possibility of her own death, Hermione had always known this might happen too: rape. She, being female, had always had this unspoken thing to fear that the boys did not. Hermione knew that for centuries, in both magical and Muggle conflicts, rape had been used as a weapon. The spoils of war – from the Trojan Wars to the Bosnian conflict, captured women and girls had been divvied out like galleons.

As Hermione contemplated this, she saw something unexpected. Her eyes happened to fall on Narcissa's hand, which abruptly reached out and clenched around Draco's, who had fallen back to stand next to her. She saw Draco's hand squeeze around his mother's in response before relinquishing it. The whole thing had taken a split second and had easily gone unseen by the others in the room. Hermione was not sure who had been comforting who but there was love in that gesture, she was sure of it, and that fact was oddly comforting.

If there was love in this room – even a tiny amount, and not even directed at her – it was still something, like a sliver of light shining through the bars of a prison cell, ensuring the captive inside didn't go completely blind from the darkness. It meant this room contained more than a sadistic madwoman with wild black hair and a foul-smelling, brutal man who wanted to rape her.

"I think Draco's right," Narcissa finally spoke up. "She could be valuable, being so close to the Potter boy. We should keep her until the Dark Lord comes. Only he should decide what is to be done with her."

Bellatrix grunted reluctantly. "Yes, I suppose you're right. Greyback, you can't play with her yet. Maybe later, if the Dark Lord wishes you to have her. Draco, take her to the cellar."

Hermione was relieved when Greyback's hand left her, and her body was borne upwards from a levitating spell of Draco's that floated her out of the drawing room. A part of her – the lion, the fighter, the thinker – tried to take note and memorise where they were going, but her vision was blurry, and she felt a jolt of pain in her temples each time she tried to focus her vision. She was only able to register a blur of wood-panelled passageways and carved oak doors until she was being levitated down some stairs into darkness and, surprisingly gently, deposited on the floor.

Draco, who had been silent for the duration of their journey to the cellar, looked at her for one short moment before turning and walking away. She heard the sound of a key turning in the lock as he closed the door behind him, and then there was only the deafening sound of silence.

Immediately, Hermione felt the powerful tug of sleep. The pull of unconsciousness was so tempting, so seductive, but she fought it. She needed to stay awake. She had to remain alert – she needed to assess and manage her injuries.

If she allowed herself to sleep now, she feared she might not wake up.

She mentally scanned her body. There were small cuts all over her exposed skin from the flying shards of glass, sharp pains in her chest, and a dull ache throughout her body from the effects of the Cruciatus Curse. Hermione concluded that her arm needed the most attention, the arm that Bellatrix had butchered with her knife. It had not stopped bleeding and blood, thick like syrup, still flowed down it. It wasn't normal to bleed so much from these kind of lacerations, and Hermione concluded that the dagger Bellatrix had used must have been cursed.

With trembling hands, she undid the belt that held up her jeans and fastened it around her upper arm like a tourniquet. She used the end of her T-shirt to staunch the blood on her arm, and watched with relief as the flow slowed.

Finally, just before the heaviness of her eyelids gave way to sleep, she was able to make out the marks that Bellatrix had carved into her skin. Or rather, letters. Letters that formed a word:

__MUDBLOOD __


	2. What They Grow To Be

**Ch. 2 What They Grow To Be**

The sound of heavy thuds and raised voices awakened Hermione. She was reasonably sure she couldn't have been asleep for long, maybe only fifteen minutes or so. Her heart stuttered as she recognised a voice that rang out from the drawing room above – a voice that reminded her of a slit nose and red eyes. She crawled around the cellar, finding a corner where there must have been some loose floorboards above which meant the voices were louder and clearer.

"Avada Kedavra!"

More thuds shook the ceiling of the cellar. Hermione wondered who Voldemort had just killed – probably the snatchers that had caught them, they were the most disposable.

Hermione heard muffled voices but could not make out any words until Bellatrix's sycophantic voice rose higher than the rest.

"But we have something, my Lord. We've got Potter's Mudblood bitch. The one that's always with him. We can use her to lure him to us – like we did with my traitorous cousin."

There were more muffled voices. Hermione could make out the intonation of Greyback's until there was a shout from Voldemort, exasperated and powerful.

"Enough! Stop with your pleading and your whining! Greyback, I will let you have the Mudblood to do what you want with, but only if you're good and please me. Only if you make up for the foolish error you have all made in letting the boy get away _again _! And you Malfoys – keep the girl in good enough condition. If she's as valuable as you say, I don't want her too damaged."

Hermione's stomach contracted yet again, and she retched violently. She hadn't eaten in what felt like days, so only liquid bile filled her mouth, which she spat out onto the cellar floor. She trembled at Voldemort's words… _to do what you want with… _and tried to comfort herself. Maybe they'd forget about her. Maybe Greyback wouldn't be able to 'please' Voldemort. Maybe she'd be okay. Somehow.

As the muffled voices continued their monotone above her, she fell into a fitful sleep once more.

* * *

When Hermione woke again, she thought she must have been asleep for a good few hours, but there was no way of knowing. There was no natural light in the cellar, only a small torch affixed to the wall in one corner which let off a dim, reluctant glow.

She realised her limbs were trembling in an odd kind of nervous way and her heart was stuttering violently. Passages from what she'd read on the Cruciatus Curse went through her mind: _Involuntary shaking and trembling are common after-effects of the curse and may last for hours, sometimes days, afterwards _. _Calming draughts may help, and the victim will surely need a period of rest in order to recover fully…. _

_Calming draughts and rest _, Hermione thought bitterly as she watched a mouse dart along the wall opposite her. The words seemed to mock her, because what good was knowing that now, when she was unlikely to get either? _No. Knowledge is good, knowledge can help _, Hermione argued with herself. _It's all you've bloody got right now, anyway. _

She jumped at the sudden sound of a key being turned in the lock of the cellar door. Her heart beat even faster as she thought about why they might have come for her, and she tried to take deep breaths, attempting to quell her rising panic.

She blinked as the light spilling from the doorway hurt her eyes and squinted up to see Draco walk steadily and slowly down the cellar steps. He stopped a few yards from her, looking her up and down as if assessing her, his eyes dispassionate. He held a ceramic bowl in his hand, steam coming from the top of it. A pewter jug and a tankard were hovering in the air next to him.

Draco wore smart jeans and a spotless, cable-knit jumper, crisp and clean, his hair styled immaculately. Hermione suddenly became acutely aware of her blood-splattered clothes, the dried urine between her legs, and the acidic taste of bile in her mouth. She wondered if she smelled.

Draco's face was expressionless as he set the bowl down on the stone floor and charmed the jug and tankard to land beside it. The contents of the bowl looked like porridge, and she wondered from the choice of meal, and Draco's change of clothes, if it was morning.

Draco opened his mouth to speak but then closed it again. Hermione kept her gaze on him, refusing to be ashamed of the state she was in. It was him and his kind that had done this to her, after all. She didn't move to take the porridge or the water, even though she desperately wanted to feel the warmth of the bowl in her cold hands.

Draco's eyes drifted to her arm; her belt was still tied around it. "What's that?" he asked scornfully.

"A tourniquet," Hermione answered dully. Then, realising Draco was probably ignorant of Muggle first aid methods, "It reduces the supply of blood to my arm. You know, so I don't bleed to death. From – from the cuts," she finished sourly.

Draco's eyes lingered on her belt. "And… has it worked?"

Hermione realised she didn't actually know the answer to that, but she noticed that her arm had gone deathly pale and her fingers were almost blue. She attempted to untie the belt with one hand, but it was trembling so much she had trouble doing so.

"Here," Draco bit out impatiently. He knelt down beside her and, before Hermione could flinch, reached out and deftly undid her belt. They both watched the letters Bellatrix had carved into Hermione's arm: they remained bright red and raw, but to Hermione's relief, did not bleed.

Apparently satisfied, Draco rose to his feet again, glancing at the bowl on the floor once more.

"It's porridge," he stated, somewhat unnecessarily. Hermione did not grace him with a response, and after they shared another wordless glance, Draco did an about-turn and strode from the room.

As soon as she heard the lock fall back into place, Hermione abruptly reached forward and grasped the bowl. She clutched it to her chest, trying to heat her torso, knowing it was important to keep her vital organs warm. As the smell of the porridge hit her nostrils, her stomach rumbled, and she noted with relief that she still had an appetite. It was likely a sign of a healthy gastric system and no internal infection.

Gingerly, she took a spoonful of the porridge. It was on her second mouthful that she had to admit to tasting something odd about it – a subtle hint of something sharp and acidic that certainly didn't belong in porridge. She had suspected that the meal might be laced with some kind of potion but had so desperately wanted to eat, she had ignored her suspicions up until now. With great regret and willpower, she placed the bowl back on the floor and slid it away from herself to try and reduce the temptation of eating any more of it.

She wondered what the potion might be. Veritaserum? She wasn't sure why they would bother after the Legilimency, and Veritserum had an extremely subtle taste. As she started to run through her Potion textbooks in her head, she found her eyes falling shut once more.

* * *

Light behind her closed eyelids.

The sound of heavy footsteps.

Blinking her eyes open, she saw Draco descending the stairs once again. She realised she was still trembling uncontrollably as Draco came to a halt next to her. He scowled at the now cold and congealed bowl of porridge.

"Why didn't you eat?" he asked, irritation clear in his voice.

"There's something in it. A potion," Hermione stated, because why would she bother lying?

Draco rolled his eyes. "It's a calming draught."

A calming draught, yes. Now that he'd said it, she realised the acidic taste had been reminiscent of one. But —

"Why are you giving me a calming draught?"

"To _calm _you, perhaps?" Draco suggested snidely as he took his wand out and performed a warming charm on the bowl. Steam rose from it once more. He placed it at Hermione's feet again and seemed to be waiting for her to take it. She didn't move; she wouldn't give him that satisfaction.

"To help with the shakes. And the heart stutters," he explained, more quietly this time.

She knew she needed the draught; she needed to calm her muscles and slow her heart rate. She remembered Voldemort's command to keep her in "good enough" condition. Maybe it _was _just a calming draught, after all.

Draco, having seemed to have given up on any response from Hermione, nudged the bowl with his foot. "Eat the fucking porridge, Granger," he retorted before turning and exiting the cellar once again.

When the door clanged shut, she reached for the bowl and started eating more fervently this time.

_Granger _…

Draco's last word seemed to reverberate around the walls of the cellar.

It was the first time she had been addressed with anything other than 'Mudblood' since the boys had left.

* * *

The next time Hermione awoke, it was due to the cold.

She'd been used to fighting off the cold during the long months of camping but she'd had magic then, and warming charms and bluebell flames had kept the worst of the bitter winter away. Now, the icy dampness of the Malfoy cellar had seemed to travel right through her skin and muscles, into her bones and had lain a nest there, like a parasite leeching her of warmth.

Although the trembling from the Cruciatus Curse had ceased as a result of the calming draught, a different kind of shaking had taken its place due to the chill of the cellar.

She hadn't been awake long before the door opened again, and Draco's now-familiar footsteps descended the stairs. He was holding another steaming bowl and set it down before her.

"Chicken soup," he stated.

Hermione was sure she saw satisfaction in the turn of Draco's lips as he took the empty porridge bowl from the floor. As he did so, her shaking foot accidentally kicked the bowl of soup. Draco looked at her and frowned as if the mere sight of her offended him. It probably did, but she was determined not to care.

"Why are you still shaking? The calming draught should have sorted that," he said accusingly.

"It's cold in here," Hermione stated simply, through chattering teeth.

Draco paused, studying her for a few moments before turning and leaving again. Compared to what he'd been like in school, he was certainly more restrained with his conversing these days, Hermione thought dryly.

To her surprise, Draco returned only a short while later with a bundle of something in his arms. Once he reached her sitting form, he held it out to her, and Hermione could see it was a blanket – thick, woollen, comforting, and no doubt beautifully warm. Despite this, the stubbornness in Hermione meant she refused to reach out to take it.

After remaining like that for several moments, as if in some perverse kind of stand-off, Draco dropped the blanket onto Hermione's lap, then turned and left the cellar again.

Hermione tentatively took the bulky coverlet and wrapped it around herself. She moved slowly, feeling that if she rushed, it might disappear, that she might jinx it in some way. As she wrapped it tightly around her shoulders, her torso, her legs – ensuring as much of her body was encased in it as possible – she gasped in delight. The blanket was giving off a delightful, relieving warmth. Someone – Draco? – had charmed it to continually give off heat.

Hermione smiled to herself for what seemed like the first time in days. She snuggled into the blanket as she remembered the hot water bottles her mother would make for her during winter nights when she was a child.

* * *

Over what Hermione thought was the next two days – it was hard to keep track of time – Draco came at regular intervals, always bearing food of some kind. Hermione gradually felt warmer, fuller, more hydrated and the pain in her body eased. With the physical healing, Hermione was able to think more clearly.

The first thing she did was cry. She allowed herself to cry then because she felt she had the strength to bear the pain of what had happened to her – what _was _happening to her. She let the sobs come, hard and uncompromising, until her tears seemed to dry up like cracked earth in a heatwave.

Then her mind regained its familiar, industrious thinking. She explored every inch of the cellar, looking for any possible ways of escape: any openings, any chinks in the wall. But there were none. There was nothing, in fact, except the four walls that leaked water, and the stairs that led to the sole way out. The only thing she did find was a pile of old rocks in one corner, a strange selection – limestone, granite, chalk.

Hermione didn't think there would be anything as mentally unbearable as the Cruciatus Curse, but she quickly learnt that boredom came a close second. Ever since she had learned to read, Hermione didn't think she had gone more than twenty-four hours without devouring some form of the written word.

Her mind felt tortured with the deprivation of it. It screamed for stimulation.

So, she started reciting all manner of things in her mind: rune translations, potion recipes, Muggle laws of physics. It helped, but not enough. Then her eyes rested on a glint of white in the corner – the chalk – and she lunged towards it, an idea coming to her.

First, she scrawled four vertical lines next to each other on one of the walls, one for each day she thought she had been in the dark prison of the cellar. She smiled ruefully at the cliché of it.

After that, she started writing out the decree of the Statue of Secrecy, then theories of magical heritability. She instantly felt calmer for doing so, for seeing it all written down on the wall in front of her. Then, it was as if her hand and mind couldn't stop, and she carried on scrawling all manner of things on the wall: her favourite quotes from literature, sayings her parents used to repeat – ones that gave her hope and comfort, that focused her mind. She knew none of it would help her situation. It would not help her escape, but it would help keep her sane, and that was more important than anything right now.

She wrote and wrote, nearly filling up one whole wall, until the chalk had run down into nothing, and she had to stop.

When Draco next entered the cellar, bearing what seemed like Irish stew, he halted abruptly as he took in the chalk-covered wall. Hermione looked up at him out of the corner of her eye from where she was sitting on the floor.

She knew her scribblings looked like the work of a madwoman, but she refused to care what Draco Malfoy might think of her.

"Wow," he finally uttered, deadpan. "Are you revising for your NEWTs, Granger? Thought you'd go back to Hogwarts this year after all?" he sneered, but Hermione was sure she detected sadness in his tone too.

She didn't answer and hoped her face conveyed the disdain she felt at his words.

After a moment, Draco waved his wand slowly, and the chalk scribblings started vanishing. He paused every now and then, as if reading what she had written and hesitated for an especially long time at one particular sentence, his arm eventually wavering and lowering, leaving those particular words untouched.

After he left, Hermione crept forward to see what quote he had left chalked into the wall. She couldn't even remember writing it. It had just sprung to her mind, and she had scribbled it down without thinking – one of Harry's favourite sayings of Dumbledore's:

_It matters not what someone is born, but what they grow to be. _

* * *

The next time Draco came, he brought several more things with him aside from food — more chalk and four books: _Hogwarts, A History; The Tales of Beedle the Bard; Wuthering Heights _by Emily Bronte; and _The Handmaid's Tale _by Margaret Atwood.

Hermione looked up at him, unable to hide her bewilderment at why he would bequeath her such things.

"Can't have you going batshit," Draco said by way of explanation. "The Dark Lord has requested you stay healthy in body _and _mind."

Her stomach churned at his words because with them, she remembered what she was being kept healthy _for _. She remembered the feel of Greyback's hand between her legs; the promise Voldemort had made to him was burnt ominously into her mind.

As usual, Hermione did not reply. She felt that by talking to Draco, she would be allowing him a privilege he didn't deserve. He frowned at her lack of response, and she got a little bit of satisfaction that maybe her silence was frustrating him. Just before he exited, he turned back to her and said in a tight voice, as if it was hard to get the words out, "Is there anything else I can get for you?"

Hermione couldn't stop a scoff escape her throat, and glared at Draco, hoping disgust was evident in her face. What did he think he could get her? Fucking lavender bubble bath and rose perfume? She _did _long to be clean again, though. She ached to have the dried blood and urine erased from her clothes and to taste the minty freshness of toothpaste in her mouth.

But she refused to ask Malfoy to Scourgify her – she had far more pride than that. She was clinging to it, the last vestiges of her pride, because it was one of the few things she had left.

"My wand?" She requested sarcastically, knowing it was futile. But she missed her wand more than anything. She felt so powerless without it, naked, vulnerable.

"I can't do that," he said solemnly, and if Hermione didn't know any better, she'd have thought she heard regret in his voice.

She thought of what else she wanted, apart from her freedom, her wand, and to be clean. Knowledge. She always wanted – _needed _– to know more. Draco was still hovering by the door, waiting.

"News?" she asked, looking up at him, making her face as unreadable as his.

There was another pause before he spoke.

"There's been no word from Potter and your gang since they Disapparated. So it's safe to presume they got away okay. All the Weasleys have gone into hiding. That glorified hut they called a house was burnt to the ground. It's nothing now but dust and ash." It was impossible to read Draco's tone, impossible to know if he was being scathing or melancholic.

She felt relief at his words and gave an imperceptible nod of acknowledgement. As he went to open the door, she couldn't help but speak.

"It was called the Burrow."

"Huh?"

"The glorified hut the Wealseys called a home. It was called the Burrow." Hermione's voice dripped with bitterness. "And it was more of a home, more full of _love _and _warmth _and _compassion _then this whole place could ever be. I'd trade _ten _of this manor for just _one _of them!"

There was a silence after Hermione's outburst, her shrill words hanging in the air between them, until Draco finally murmured, "Whatever, Granger," and left her once more.


	3. Cleaned and Prettied

**Ch. 3 Cleaned and Prettied **

Things continued in much the same vein, except Draco started to bring her breakfast and dinner only; a sullen house-elf would come and place lunch at her feet. Hermione's existence became long stretches of boredom interspersed with short, sharp bursts of anxiety whenever anyone entered the cellar. She was never sure what they were coming for, and her fear peaked every time a key turned to unlock the door.

On the tenth day after she'd first been brought down to the cellar, Draco came to take her out. He wordlessly half-pulled and half-charmed her through the corridors and up the stairs of the manor. The bright light of the hallways hurt her eyes, and she stumbled, disoriented by moving so fast after being practically motionless for so long.

"Where are we going? What's happening? " Hermione asked, trying to keep the fear out of her voice.

Draco remained silent, and Hermione didn't ask again. Through her quick, furtive glances at him, she noticed he looked ill. He had a greyish complexion, his eyes were bloodshot, and a perpetual frown creased his forehead.

Finally, she was marched into a bedroom. She managed to take in emerald green covers on a four-poster bed and a Quidditch poster on the wall before Draco thrust them into an en-suite bathroom and finally released her.

Hermione paused, taking in the luxurious surroundings — gilt-framed mirrors, a gleaming marble floor, a roll top bath filled with steaming water. She spotted makeup products on a counter and a beautiful silk dress hanging from a snake-shaped brass hook on the wall.. With an uneasy churn of her stomach, she noted the dress was her size.

"What's this?" she asked, looking accusingly at Malfoy.

His mouth twisted into a grimace. Staring straight ahead of him at the gold taps of the sink, he said, "Greyback pleased the Dark Lord, so you've been offered to him as a gesture of thanks."

A chill crept down Hermione's spine, rippled out and travelled through the rest of her body. Her legs felt suddenly weak, and her thoughts started colliding into each other chaotically. She willed herself not to panic.

She looked around the room once more at the steaming bath – no doubt ready for her – and the cosmetic paraphernalia. As if in answer to her silent question, Draco continued.

"He wants you cleaned and prettied," he stated bitterly, visibly swallowing as if he was forcing down his own sick.

She had often pondered about what losing her virginity might be like. She wasn't naïve or sentimental – she had known it would probably be awkward and fumbling – but she had always hoped it would be with someone with whom she shared a mutual affection, a warmth, maybe even love.

She looked again at the silk dress. It was a deep crimson. The colour of blood, but also the colour of Gryffindor. A wave of nostalgia hit her like a rogue bludger as she remembered the Hermione that would sit by the fire in the Gryffindor common room, rolling her eyes as the Weasley twins turned Romilda Vane's hair blue. Happy, safe, hopeful, and innocent. She didn't recognise that girl now.

A sob wracked her body, hard and sharp. Another one threatened to spill from her, but she pushed her hand to her mouth, forcing it down.

"What if I don't? What if I don't… clean and pretty myself?" she managed to ask.

Malfoy momentarily flicked his eyes at her, before settling them on the gold taps again. It was the first time he'd so much as glanced at her since taking her from the cellar, and Hermione wondered if maybe he was ashamed of the task he had to carry out this evening. Well, so he should be.

"They'll force you," his voice was quiet but hard. "He wants you aware when – when he does it. But this bit beforehand… Well, there's always Imperious. You'll be made to do it either way."

Hermione stared at the swirls of patterns in the marble floor, trying to quell her nausea, her chest rising and falling rapidly. She felt Draco shift beside her.

"I don't think he wants to turn you. Greyback, I mean – just..." he trailed off.

She barked a laugh, hard and hysterical. "No. Just wants to __fuck __me? Just to –" but she found she couldn't bring herself to say the word. "And is it just for one night or –" Her voice broke; she couldn't continue.

Draco remained silent.

"You don't even know, do you? You've just been sent to deliver the goods in __quality__ condition." Hermione was relieved to hear that there was still fight in her voice.

Draco didn't respond. Her mind started to reel through escape plans, her eyes involuntarily going to the window, then the mirrors. Maybe if she broke the glass, she could stab Draco when he returned to get her and then – and then –

"The glass is unbreakable, Granger. Even with a wand. And the window is heavily warded," Draco said as if he'd used Legilimency on her. Which was completely impossible — he didn't have a wand in his hand. "The whole estate is, with powerful and ancient protective enchantments. Only the current heads of the house can lower the wards, which at the current time is my parents. Not even the Dark Lord can change them. My parents cannot give him that power, the magic is too old. An escape attempt would be futile." His voice was dull and tired.

Hermione let his words sink in. Each one felt like a twist of one of Bellatrix's knives.

"I'll be coming for you in an hour and a half. But if you need anything before then, ring that bell." Draco nodded to brass bell-pull that hung from the wall. It was a bit like the old servants' sprung bells she'd seen in__National Trust __country houses she'd visited with her parents as a child. The memory sent another painful wave of nostalgia rolling over her.

Before turning to go, Draco paused as if wanting to say something else, but clearly decided against it and left, locking the door behind him.

Hermione stayed in the bath until her skin had shrivelled like a prune, and the water had gone cold. She found the scolding - then cooling - water helped her to think. Although she couldn't __physically __escape tonight, maybe there was another way.

By the time she applied the makeup she'd been left and slipped the lacy underwear and silk dress on, she'd formed a plan. It was a tenuous plan, and it rested on an unknown, crucial factor: Draco Malfoy.

She rang the bell with at least half an hour to spare – she needed as much time as possible to attempt her plan – and Draco came into the bathroom once more. He stopped abruptly when he saw her, his eyes widening and lips parting in apparent surprise.

She supposed she did look quite different to when he had left her. The dress was a perfect fit. It showed off the rise of her breasts and the curve of her small waist, whilst at the same time remaining elegant and tasteful. She had applied the makeup in the way Parvati had shown her in fifth year – smoky eyes, blusher to make her cheeks flush __just so __, her lipstick blood red. She'd tied her hair up, but let the odd cascade of curls fall from it, tickling her shoulders and emphasising her bare neck.

Draco gave an imperceptible nod. Why, Hermione wasn't sure. Was it in greeting? In gratitude that she had dolled herself up like a prize mare about to be sold at a show?

Hermione took a deep breath. "Draco," she began, trying to make her voice sound warm. "I – I wanted to ask you something."

Draco raised his eyebrows, his eyes guarded. She took a tentative step towards him.

"A werewolf, in wolf or human form, won't – can't – mate with a female if they can smell that the female has recently mated with another male. They'll be too repulsed. Even if the female scrubs herself raw, they can still smell the scent of the other male for days afterwards. Their biology will prevent them from going near the female. And, uh, part of why Greyback wants me is because –" She hesitated, not quite believing she was talking so intimately with Draco-fucking-Malfoy. But it was survival. She was doing this for survival. "Because I'm a virgin. He might – he might be put off for good if I wasn't..." Her words seemed to trail away completely.

"I know all that," Draco said sullenly. "So?"

Hermione forced herself to take another step towards him. She wasn't sure if he was being deliberately obtuse or if he really didn't understand what she was getting at, but either way, she realised she would have to spell it out.

"So… we could… You could… We could – together. And then he won't want me," she finished, hoping desperately that Draco understood, and she wouldn't have to carry on with her bumbling explanation, or request, or whatever it was. To her relief, she saw understanding dawn on his face that morphed into an expression of indignation.

"For fuck's sake, Granger! You want me to – so he won't want you –" He sounded outraged. "What – why? Why would you rather me than him?"

"Because..." Why was the thought of being with Draco so much less horrifying than being raped by Greyback? "You're – you're different. You're not like him," was all she could manage.

"The lesser of two evils?" He shook his head fervently. "No fucking way."

Hermione hadn't known what to expect – whether Draco would agree easily or adamantly refuse. Unfortunately, the latter seemed to be the case, but she was prepared for this eventuality. She'd rehearsed every tactic as she'd lain in the cooling bath and so, reluctantly, she turned to plan B now.

She turned her lips up into a coy smile and made her tongue dart out to lick them, before finishing by biting her bottom lip between her teeth.

"Draco." She tried to make her voice sultry and stepped towards him, so he was bound to smell the perfume they'd given her. She reached out to rest a hand on his chest. It was a bold move, and she wasn't sure if Draco noticed her arm tremble as she did so. He flinched slightly but otherwise didn't move.

"I've always wanted you, you know," she lied, turning her voice to a conspiratorial whisper. "I've always admired the way you held yourself at school… The way you played Quidditch. You were one of the best."

She saw his frown deepen as if he was trying to make sense of her actions and words. As she leaned closer to him his eyelids fluttered shut, and he inhaled deeply. She noticed with surprise – but also hope – a flush of red creep to his cheeks.

But then he grabbed her wrist and shoved her hand away from his chest, keeping his hold on it as if her touch were a weapon.

"__Bullshite!" __ he exclaimed, his eyes gleaming in anger. "You think I'm that stupid?"

Despair coursed through Hermione at Draco's obvious refusal to be taken in by her no doubt unsophisticated and clumsy seductive techniques.

She felt a desperate hopelessness at the perverse paradox that was convincing Draco Malfoy to take her against her will.

But survival instinct made her calm herself and attempt another tactic. She stepped backwards from Draco, and this time turned her lips into a sneer as she crossed her arms and looked him up and down disdainfully.

"Don't think you're up to it, Draco?" She made her voice bitter and mocking. "Don't think you can __rise __to the challenge? Scared your sad little dick wouldn't work if you tried? Is it too __small __, Draco? Too __weenie__?" she said with mock pity, in a tone nauseatingly reminiscent of his own sadistic aunt.

In that moment, she hated herself.

He sneered back at her, clearly unmoved by her words. "Really? __Really __? You're going lower yourself to a pathetic attempt to offend my masculinity by insulting the potential size and workability of my genitalia? You're going to resort to using toxic masculine stereotypes to try and agitate me into – into –" He stopped and faltered, shaking his head as if trying to clear something from it.

Hermione realised she'd underestimated him. He surprised her. In fact, he'd surprised her in many ways since she'd been a prisoner in his house. She only really had one tactic left, and she resorted to it now – pleading.

"Draco, please… I know you can't do much to help me but this would be a good thing to do. I know you've probably not had good choices –"

"This probably tops the list of worst fucking choices," he spat out. He looked disgusted, and something occurred to her.

"You can't bear the thought of it, can you? I'm just too repulsive? I'm __that __filthy to you? Despite the rose perfume and lavender bubble bath and the fucking silk dress!"

"What? No! No, Granger, that's not it at all!"

"Of course it is! You can't bear to sully yourself with a Mudblood. Do you think it's contagious Malfoy? My __Muggle-ness?! __You're scared you'll catch it?"

"Don't be fucking stupid! That's not it at all!"

"Then what is __it __?"

"It's that I don't want you like this! I don't want to __rape __you!"

There was a stunned silence at Draco's outburst. The word they had both refused to say up to now echoed off the tiled walls of the bathroom, inescapable and accusing.

"It – it wouldn't be rape," Hermione said quietly, her shaking voice betraying her lack of conviction. "Not if I've chosen it, if I've asked for it."

__But would it?__ She didn't know, and she really didn't think she had time for semantic discussions. She just knew that the thought of Draco was so much more tolerable than that of Greyback. __The lesser of two evils. __She recalled Draco's own words.

She thought of the calming draught, of the charmed blanket, of the pieces of chalk and the worn pages of Beedle the Bard. She knew Draco had probably been tasked with keeping her in __good condition __, but there was something more in those gestures, Hermione knew it. There was kindness in those gestures, surely.

"Draco, I know you can be better," Hermione began, and this time her words were genuine. "Maybe you don't believe it yourself, but there's a goodness in you. I saw it when you didn't identify Harry, I heard it in your cry when you stopped Bellatrix from killing me. And why didn't you tell her about the sword, Draco? There's a goodness in you, and that's why. That's why I'd choose you over him – a thousand times."

There was a pause. "A goodness?" Malfoy repeated contemptuously.

"Yes."

Draco looked at the floor for a moment, then shook his head as if trying to clear it. "I don't know if I can."

"What do you mean?"

"I – I'll need to – to finish inside you... for Greyback to be put off – for it to work. I don't know if I'll be able to – not when – not when things are like this."

__Of course. __He didn't want her, no more than she wanted him. Not because she was Muggle-born, but simply because he didn't like her like that. And why would he?

"You can transfigure me if you want?" She thought of Pansy Parkinson – they probably had a similar build but that's where the likeness ended. "Change my hair, so it's shorter? Darker?"

Malfoy sneered. "Your appearance really isn't the problem, Granger." And then, almost inaudibly, "It's the last thing I want to change." Before she had the time to dwell on what he meant, he continued. "It's just – just the situation."

Hermione glanced at the clock – they probably only had fifteen minutes left before Draco was due to take her to Greyback. Panic flared at the edges of her mind.

"We could pretend? Like, role play?" she suggested desperately.

"What, pretend that we've just gone on a nice date? Shall __I __transfigure my hair __red __?"

She laughed at that because if she didn't laugh, she felt she might collapse in despair. It came out slightly hysterical again, but there was genuine amusement in it too.

She noticed something soften around Draco's eyes.

"Your whole face changes when you laugh, you know that?" he said quietly, as if he were talking to himself. She'd never heard that tone in his voice before – contemplative, gentle.

There was a pause as they both looked at each other. Hermione didn't dare move, as if Draco were a frightened animal she didn't want to startle.

Finally, he abruptly shook his head as if disbelieving what he was about to say. "Fine. Fuck it."

He deftly leaned forward, took her hand and led her from the bathroom into the room beyond. Hermione quickly surmised it must have been Draco's bedroom, and he walked them slowly to his four-poster bed as if he were leading them both to the gallows.


	4. The Lesser of Two Evils

**Ch. 4 The Lesser of Two Evils **

It was mercifully quick and not as painful as Hermione had feared. Draco insisted on making it so.

"No kissing on the lips. Please," she'd requested as she laid down on the bed, and he had followed, leaning over her. He nodded sharply in agreement.

Draco must have known that her body would never be naturally prepared, not in these circumstances, because he conjured a charm which made her warm and wet between her legs. His touches were gentle and tentative as he stroked her legs, pushing her dress up to around her hips, kissing her neck and her shoulders. Hermione let him, because she realised he needed to be ready too – in order to __perform __. Maybe these kisses and touches were what he needed to do – to bury himself in her skin and pretend she was someone else; that they were somewhere else.

To her surprise, she found his kisses and touches did not repulse her, but instead, her skin tingled pleasantly at the feel of them. As a result, her body warmed and her tight muscles loosened slightly. This relieved and disconcerted her at the same time, because she was not meant to enjoy this, did not __want __to enjoy this.

Draco's breathing became more shallow, and she felt him harden against her thigh. They were both nearly fully clothed, her dress hiked up around her waist, his trousers and boxers pulled only as far down as they needed to be.

He glanced at her. "Are you ready? Are you sure?" he asked.

__No, and no __, Hermione thought, but instead, she nodded.

When he entered her, it was still a shock – both physically and emotionally. Hermione mourned for what she had hoped for in this moment, although she knew it could have been worse. In Draco's awkward, hesitant touches there was a kindness, and Hermione clung to that like a drowning man to a piece of driftwood.

Silent tears rolled down her cheeks as he came inside her, groaning into her neck. When he'd finished and he looked at her and noticed the tears, his face contorted into an expression she hadn't seen before. It was one of naked anguish and despair.

"It's okay –" she tried to reassure him but was interrupted by a loud knock on the door that made her body stiffen.

"Draco? Have you got the girl? They're waiting for you to bring her down!" Lucius' voice called out.

Draco leaned over her, his eyes closed, catching his breath before calling out, "Yes, father. We'll be down in a minute." His voice was firm and definitive, defying anyone to object.

"Fine, we'll wait downstairs. But he's getting impatient, so hurry."

Hermione knew the "he" Lucius had referred to was unlikely to be Greyback, and her body went cold at the thought that she may soon have to be in the presence of Voldemort.

Draco hurriedly climbed off the bed and adjusted his clothes, and Hermione followed suit. She saw that there were small, dark patches on her dress where Draco's come had spilt. She knew it would be best if it remained there, but at the same time, the thought of it made her feel filthy, dirty – everything they thought she was.

Draco paused after he had straightened his clothes and looked her up and down as if assessing her. Then, before she knew what was happening, he flicked his wand at her. She felt her face just below her left eye swell, felt a tingling on her wrists and looked down to see purple bruises spread across her skin, and heard her dress rip at her cleavage.

"What are you doing?" she gasped.

"Making it look like you were forced," Draco responded gravely, and before Hermione had a chance to respond, he had pulled her from the room.

* * *

She was taken to the drawing room again. As they walked in, Hermione noticed Draco's demeanour change; he stood straighter, stiffer, and a mask descended over his face so his expression was cold and unreadable.

"Ah! Finally, the little whore has been delivered. Fenrir, take your gift. Go on." The voice that spoke was as soft as velvet.

Hermione's blood turned to ice in her veins as she eyed Voldemort where he sat aloof and disdainful on one of the plush armchairs by the fire.

He didn't look at her, as if her very presence was too trivial to garner his gaze. Narcissa sat tense and awkward in a chair next to him, and Lucius stood as still as a statue beside her. Hermione was relieved to see that Bellatrix was absent.

Hermione had halted inside the door of the room – her feet had stopped moving, seemingly of her their own accord – but at Voldemort's words, Draco pushed her forward, and Greyback scuttled towards her, an awful leer on his face exposing yellow teeth.

He was relentless in his advance and came within an inch of her. Almost immediately, his nose twitched, and his hand came up to cover it as if he were revolted by what he smelled. Hermione saw disbelief cloud his eyes.

"You – you've been taken already," he growled. He drew back from her. "What have you done, you little slut?"

There was movement beyond them. Voldemort was getting to his feet and moving towards the trio at the door, followed by Lucius and Narcissa. It seemed that Greyback's raised voice had piqued his interest.

The werewolf rounded on Draco. "You've taken my __present __!" he roared, like a spoilt child on Christmas day, before turning back to Hermione. "You filthy whore!"

"Doesn't look like she had much of a say in the matter, judging from those bruises," Lucius said, his voice was dry and measured.

All four turned to Hermione, and she imagined what she must look like through their eyes: tear-streaked cheeks, smudged makeup around terror-filled eyes, dishevelled hair, a black eye, bruised wrists and a ripped, come-stained dress.

She felt pitiful, but at the same time relieved that the plan seemed to have worked.

"Really, Draco, what have you done?" Lucius' voice was smooth but there was an anxious edge to it.

Draco shrugged, and Hermione was amazed at his nonchalance. "Thought she turned out quite nicely. Didn't think they'd be any harm if I prepped her a bit."

Hermione realised what he was doing. She'd known it already, really, ever since he'd cast the spells that ripped her dress and bruised her skin – he was taking full responsibility for what had happened between them.

"No, I – I wanted –" she began automatically.

"Shut up, Mudblood," Draco spat out, silencing her. "I've heard enough of your __moaning __for one night."

Voldemort, who had remained quiet up until then, made a tutting noise. It was an otherwise inconsequential utterance but coming from him, it chilled Hermione to her core.

"Oh, Draco," he said with mock pity. "Did you not know that Greyback would not be able to accept my gift if you had a little play first? I admire your virility and your assertiveness, but she really wasn't for sharing. And for that, you have to be punished."

There was a small sound from beyond Voldemort – a squeak of protest or pain from Narcissa.

"Yes, my Lord." Draco barely moved, and Hermione realised that he must have known this would happen. Why hadn't she thought of it? She was effectively under Voldemort's control, which meant that Draco had been going against his master's orders by complying with what she had asked of him.

Voldemort raised his wand towards Draco.

"Crucio." The word was uttered casually as if he were asking a house-elf for sugar in his tea.

Draco collapsed to the floor, his limbs contorting involuntarily as a low, anguished groan came from his mouth. Hermione's insides twisted. She knew it was her fault this was happening. She had caused this suffering.

She tried not to think about how it felt to be under that curse. If she empathised too much, she was afraid she would try and stop it – cry out, maybe even run to Draco, and she knew that would not end well for either of them.

She wasn't sure how long it went on for. The minutes seemed to creep by agonisingly slowly. She noticed Narcissa sway ever so slightly, so subtle only Hermione and Lucius seemed to notice, and Hermione saw how he reached out and took his wife's arm in support.

Greyback was looking down at the torture scene as if entranced, a smug smile on his face as the slight that Draco had dealt him was avenged by his master.

Finally, it stopped.

"Enough!" Voldemort cried abruptly when he'd finished. "I'm bored of these squabbles over a silly Mudblood girl! If you Malfoys step one more foot out of line, you'll be punished even more severely." He strode over the armchair by the fire and sat down again. His movements, in contrast to his voice, were delicate and regal.

"Young Malfoy," Voldemort continued from his reclined position. "You've claimed the whore now, you may as well keep her. Keep her in your chambers, if you desire her so much. No one else will want the little slut now. You have my permission to put her to good use, but just don't damage the goods too much. She best be as valuable as you say she is, causing all this trouble."

"Yes, my Lord." Draco's voice was barely a croak from where he still lay, curled up on the drawing room floor

* * *

Hermione, it seemed, would now be kept a prisoner in Draco's bedroom. It was what Voldemort had ordered, and so it must be the case.

It was a strange sort of prison; comfortable and luxurious compared to the cellar, but a prison nonetheless. And it was also Draco's bedroom, which felt oddly intimate.

"I'll have to sleep in here too. He'll know otherwise, and it was his order. We can share the bed. I won't touch you," was the only thing Draco said to her during her first evening there.

The bed was enormous, and after the trouble it had taken to convince Draco to have sex with her, Hermione wasn't at all worried he would take advantage of their close sleeping quarters.

She slid awkwardly between the sheets at bedtime, still in her red dress. Draco frowned at her.

"I don't have any other clothes. The others are so dirty," she explained.

Draco said nothing but turned and rifled in his wardrobe, returning to her and flinging a Slytherin-crested T-shirt at her before going into the bathroom. Hermione hurriedly took off the dress. She was so relieved to get rid of it; she wanted to burn the thing. She hated what it represented, hated the memories that now seemed interwoven in its seams.

The T-shirt was crisp and clean and smelt of laundry soap, long enough that it came down to Hermione's mid-thighs, and she absolutely loved it. The bed linen was similar and with the pillow soft against her cheek, she fell asleep almost immediately.

* * *

"Don't kill them! Please don't kill them!"

A desperate, beseeching voice woke Hermione. She quickly realised that it belonged to Draco, and as she blinked through the dark that separated them, she noticed he was thrashing about in bed, his limbs jerking involuntarily in the depths of some nightmare. "I'll do it… I'll do it… Just don't hurt them."

She instinctively reached out a hand and placed it on Draco's arm, murmuring his name, but the thrashing and crying out continued.

"Draco," she said louder, and he jolted awake.

"What – what's wrong?" His eyes sprang open, wide and shining with something she hadn't seen in them before: terror.

"You – you were having a nightmare," Hermione explained gently.

His body was still then, and he just grunted in response but didn't speak. She supposed there wasn't really much to say.

As they lay side by side, waiting for sleep to take them once more, Hermione found herself doing something she didn't quite understand. She slid her hand over the sheets, closing the gap between their two bodies, and found Draco's fingers with her own. She lightly – tentatively – placed her hand over his and felt him stiffen.

She wondered whether he would brush her away, but her heart fluttered oddly as he turned his hand so they were palm to palm, interlaced his fingers with hers, and squeezed ever so slightly.

That was how they stayed until they both fell asleep.

* * *

They didn't see each other during the day. Hermione learnt that Draco actually Apparated in and out of Hogwarts each morning and afternoon; the Dark Lord wanted him at the manor at all other times. Every morning, he left her in her gilded cage with a stack of new books. Aside from the house-elf that brought her lunch, she did not see or speak to anyone else.

Draco cried out in his sleep every night, variations of the same words, and every night, Hermione would reach out a hand to comfort him. He never pushed her away. She started to find his presence next to her strangely comforting – the sound of his breath, steady and regular, when he wasn't crying out from a nightmare, of course. She wondered if she had Stockholm syndrome, thinking over what she had read of the phenomenon in her mind. But no, it didn't quite feel like that.

When they were both wrapped under the heavy, warm covers of Draco's bed, and when the darkness meant they didn't have to look at each other, they began to talk. They had short, brief conversations, but Hermione felt that each word was weighed down with a thousand meanings.

"Do you remember crying out?" Draco asked during the second night they slept in the same bed after she'd reached out to clasp her hand in his. "When she was torturing you?"

"I – well – some of it," Hermione murmured quietly into the dark.

"You cried for Weasley. You cried his name. He was yelling for you, and it was like you were crying back. But then he'd gone, and you still cried for him." There was a pause. Hermione couldn't remember crying Ron's name. "I can't believe they left you, the fucktards."

"They didn't mean to. It was an accident." Hermione responded. "And they better not be stupid enough to come back."

Draco just grunted in response, and a short while later Hermione heard the steady sound of his sleeping breaths.

The next night, when Draco woke them both with his night terrors, Hermione inched her body towards him and reached her arm out, draping it across his chest.

Draco didn't respond, didn't acknowledge her movement by making one himself, he didn't move to put his arm around her. But he didn't push her away either.

* * *

"You never gave in. You never told her the sword was real," Draco asked another night as they'd both lay in bed, waiting for sleep to come. "How did you have the strength to withstand it?"

"I don't know," Hermione replied honestly.

"Since when don't you know something?" Draco asked, an unusual lightness to his voice.

She realised he might be affectionately teasing her, and something glowed near her heart at the thought of it.

"You're going to hate me saying this Draco, but I think it was love."

"Love?" Predictably, his voice was scornful.

"Yes. I don't love Harry and Ron in that way, but I love them like brothers. And I think it was my desire to keep them safe that helped me withstand the pain of that curse." Draco was silent. "He hates it, you know. Love." Hermione didn't think she had to state who she was referring to. "Or rather, he disregards it. Underestimates it and doesn't understand it's power. He thinks it makes people weak when really it does the contrary."

"You really think that?" he asked contemplatively. Draco's fingers stroked absentmindedly up and down her forearm where she had laid it across his chest again, and she found she loved how his touch felt.

"Yes," she said definitively, for it was one thing she could be certain of.

He moved then, shuffled his own arm so it was under her neck, pulling her towards him, and she moved naturally to rest her head in the crook of his shoulder, delighting in the feel of his body next to hers.

* * *

"Why was I any better than Greyback? Why would you rather it had been me than him?" he asked, the fourth night they were together, sleeping in the same bed.

"You're not like him. You're nothing like him. As I said, you're better than him. There's a goodness in you."

Malfoy scoffed, the sound loud in the quiet of the night. "The lesser of two evils."

Hermione thought before responding. "Why didn't you kill Dumbledore, Draco?" she eventually asked.

"Because I'm a coward," Draco suggested bitterly.

"No, I don't believe that. I think there was a danger in __not __killing him – not killing him could have been the bravest thing you've done. I think you didn't kill him because there's goodness in you. When you convinced her to stop, I heard it in your voice. You saved me, I tasted it in the calming draught in the porridge. I can smell it in the T-shirt you gave me, see it on the pages of the books you handed me in the cellar."

Another, deafening silent pause. Then, "You've left out touch, Granger."

In response, she lifted her head and reached out blindly to stroke her fingers down his cheek. She leaned in to feel the warmth of his breath against her face and moved down to touch her lips against his. She felt him momentarily freeze at her touch, but then felt the feel of his lips hesitantly press back onto hers before pulling away.

"You don't have to do this," he murmured.

"I know. I want to," she replied softly.

After another moment that seemed laden with indecision, he lifted his head up to press his lips to hers again, and they kissed slowly and tentatively. Nerves tingled along Hermione's spine, straight to her core, as she felt his hands hold her gently on either side of her waist as their kiss deepened.

Hermione delighted in this new positioning, with her whole body pressed to his, her breasts pushed against his chest, her legs interwoven with his. She moaned into his mouth when she felt him harden against her leg. He lifted his thigh so it pressed against her clit, the feel of it making her kiss him with an urgency and fervour she hadn't kissed anyone before.

With considerable willpower, she pulled away after several moments, overwhelmed by the depth of feeling she was experiencing. She needed to pause, to think what it meant for her body to have responded in such a way to Draco Malfoy, before she gave in to pure sensation and possibly did things she would regret later.

She laid her head on his chest once more, and he didn't say anything, didn't ask why they had stopped, just seemed to accept it unquestioningly. His fingers stroked soothingly through her hair until she found herself falling asleep once more.

They awoke in the early hours of the next morning in the same position, the blue light of dawn encasing the room. Hermione could feel his hardness against her again, and it sent a rush of wet heat between her legs. Draco's hand travelled down her spine to her arse, stroking, kneading, and pinching there, causing her breathing to quicken as she let out an involuntary whimper into his neck.

She raised her head to meet his gaze; his eyes were questioning, hopeful, and Hermione wasn't sure how to make sense of them. Instead, she pressed her lips to his again. The kiss was uninhibited this time – hungry and urgent.

Draco moved his hand between her legs, placing it hesitantly at the top of her thigh as if asking permission. She nodded and in response, he ran his finger along her wet folds. She moaned into his mouth as he massaged his fingers against her clit in short, rhythmic movements.

She kissed him wherever she could access, peppering his neck, his shoulder, his chest as he built an exquisite tension in her which finally broke. She shuddered and trembled against him as she came.

That morning, just before Draco left for Hogwarts, he did something he hadn't done before. He cupped her head in his hands and kissed her gently on the lips before Floo'ing away.

* * *

"Why did you choose to take the mark, Draco?" she asked him the next night as she ran a finger along the outline of the snake burnt into his left forearm. He paused for so long Hermione thought he wasn't going to answer.

"It wasn't about choice. It was about loyalty."

"But we always have a choice, Draco."

"Between the lesser of two evils?" His voice was characteristically cynical.

"Yes. Sometimes. But it's still a choice," she remarked, bringing his arm up and kissing it just on the mouth of the skull.

"How can you bear to touch it?" he whispered.

"It's just a mark," she replied.

He barked a derisive laugh. "It's __not __just a mark."

"I think it is," she said and shifted to run her fingers along the bandages that encased her own left arm. Bellatrix's cuts had not bled again, but they'd remained open, raw and angry, causing Draco to insist she bandage them to reduce the risk of infection. "People can mark us, but it's up to us whether we internalise – or reject – the labels they've branded us with."

He only responded with his usual grunt, and Hermione accepted that was all she was going to get from him.

* * *

"What's it like? Hogwarts?" she asked him when he brought up her dinner the next evening.

He glanced at her, looked away out of the window. She followed his gaze to the trees of the orchard that were thick with a lush green now that they were in the midst of Spring. It seemed he was reluctant to answer. Maybe he knew how precious Hogwarts was to her and didn't want to impart sad news.

"Tell me," she insisted, reaching out and taking his hand. She noticed how quickly it had taken her to get comfortable interacting with his body like this.

"It's like a Death Eater training camp, Granger," he replied, and she didn't ask anymore.

* * *

On the tenth evening she had been a prisoner of Draco's bedroom, he came to her with a difference in his stance. There was an energy about him she hadn't sensed before.

"My parents have gone away and the Dark Lord's abroad. I'm the head of the house in their absence. Which means I can change the wards," he said with a hint of triumph in his voice.

She stood from the chair she'd been reading in and faced him, waiting for him to continue, not quite allowing herself to hope just yet.

"I can get you out, Granger! Get you the fuck out of here," he explained, more enthusiastic than she had ever seen him.

"Oh." Her mind reeled. She thought of Harry and Ron, of Voldemort and the Horcruxes. Of course – __of course__ – if it were possible, she had to try and escape.

"I've managed to get in touch with my aunt, Andromeda. She's given me instructions of where you can Apparate to. She'll help you get back to Potter after that."

"Oh," Hermione repeated, still trying to take in the information. "Draco... Really – you're sure – you can do this?"

"Yes. It might be your only chance. You'd be a fool not to take it. And if it's true – that Potter's the only one that can end him – you need to get back to him."

He knew she was right. Despite this – this affection, or whatever it was that had grown between her and Draco – there was no question she had to go. But –

"Come with me, Draco," she said softly.

He looked at her, eyes glinting with a spark of hope before fading to dark again. "I can't."

"We'll look after you. The Order – I'll tell them what you did. You always have a choice, Draco,"

"I know. And I'm choosing to stay," At Hermione's beseeching look he continued, his voice grave. "He'll kill them. My parents. One or both of them. He'll kill them as punishment for me if I renounce his cause."

As Draco's words sank in, snippets of conversations they'd had slotted together in Hermione's mind: __It wasn't about choice. It was about loyalty __. She realised now he'd been talking about his loyalty to his family, to his parents – not to Voldemort.

His love for his parents had probably made it feel like there had been no other way.

"That's who your dreams are about, aren't they? Your nightmares. That's who you imagine dying?"

"Yes," the word was bitten out between clenched teeth.

She rose and wrapped her arms around his shoulders, pulling him to her in an uncompromising hug, knowing now that there was no way he would choose to come with her.

"But you'll get in so much trouble, won't you? If I escape under your watch?" she mumbled into his shoulder.

Draco shrugged dismissively as if that were a moot, minor point. "I can handle it."

"He'll know – he's so good at Legilimency."

"And I'm the best at Occlumency. Don't worry about me, Granger."

Hermione clutched onto Draco, her mind folding into thoughts and plans and all manner of possible scenarios.

"Okay," she agreed. "When?"

"The early hours of tomorrow. I'll take you beyond the wards to the boundary of the estate. You can pass through them in my presence and then Disapparate away."

* * *

They had sex that night for the second time, although to Hermione it felt like the first.

It was so different from the time she had been forced to wear that red dress, when it had been tense and awkward for both of them. Then, both of them had clearly wanted it to be over with as soon as possible, but this time Draco seemed to take an inordinate amount of time with her body – touching, stroking, kissing, and nipping at it.

On occasion, he would just stare down at her, his eyes roaming over her as if taking all of her in, burning her into his memory. She found herself giggling self-consciously under his impenetrable gaze. He teased her body with his tongue and his fingers, and she found herself moaning wantonly, arching her back, her hands fisting into the sheets beside her as he dipped his fingers into her.

When he entered her, they both let out mutual moans as if relieved, and he paused momentarily, looking at her intently with lust-glazed eyes. As he started moving inside her, she felt an overwhelming wave of emotions, for this was one of the things she'd mourned that she might never experience – to lie with a man in passion – and she was so relieved, so grateful to have this now.

She didn't want it to end. She wanted to stay joined and connected to Draco like this forever, but at the same time, her body was crying for release. She came in a succession of moans and cries that she muffled by pressing her mouth against Draco's neck.

It was the only time she broke their gaze because she realised she loved looking into his eyes when they fucked. It was the only time they lost their hollow, haunted look.

She wanted to take that look from him forever, burn the sorrow from his eyes for good. But she knew she couldn't.

* * *

At two o'clock the next morning, Draco walked Hermione to just outside the boundary of his estate, and they both passed through the wards unharmed. She held a wand firmly in her hand – not her own, one from a snatcher that Draco had found in the family safe. She had practised a few charms with it, and it seemed to work okay.

It felt so good to have a wand again. Hermione had nearly cried when he'd given it to her, along with her beaded bag he'd sneaked from where it had been kept in his mother's room.

"You can Disapparate from here," he said, halting beside an oak tree and reaching out to squeeze her hand. "You remember where?"

"Yes," Hermione said and repeated the location of Andromeda's safe house.

Draco's eyes were pained, and his lips turned up into a rueful smile. "Don't get fucking caught again, Granger," he demanded.

"I – I'll try not to," she responded, because she never made promises she couldn't keep.

He nodded, short and sharp, indicating he knew that was the best she could give him.

He cupped her jaw in his hand, and she raised her head. Their lips pressed together in a slow, lingering kiss before he pulled her head towards his chest and spoke into her hair, his voice low but firm.

"Will you come back to me, Granger? If we both come out of this shitstorm alive – will you come back to me?"

She nodded into his chest, silent tears spilling from her eyes. "Yes," she mumbled.

That was a promise she __could __make.

Then, before he released her from the hug, she raised her wand subtly in her hand, pointed it at his body and whispered, "Stupefy."

She had tried to make the spell as gentle as possible, but the wand was still new to her and Draco's body was raised slightly in the air before falling to the ground.

With tears falling from her eyes, Hermione leant down and pointed her wand at Draco's temple.

"Obliviate," she murmured

Before she'd had to perform the spell on her parents, Hermione had practised Obliviate endlessly, ensuring she had perfected it, and she had become more than proficient at targeting precise memories. She left Draco with small snippets of when they had fucked the first time, so to anyone looking through his memories, it would look like he had taken her against her will.

Everything else, she took from him, except for snippets of the exchanges in the cellar – she allowed him those.

She had to do it. Because when it was discovered that she had escaped, Draco would be punished and his mind searched. No matter how good at Occlumency Draco was, when Legilimency was relentless, done by someone as skilled as Voldemort, and accompanied by torture, Hermione knew there was no defence against it. Voldemort would find out everything.

If Draco were to be found to have been kind to her, to not have raped her but to have – she didn't know what it was, but she knew it had not been an act of violence or hate – Voldemort would not forgive it. If he saw what had passed between them in the warmth of Draco's bed... It was what Voldemort hated most in the world – compassion, kindness, affection, love – and Draco was sure to suffer unbearably for it.

And Hermione could not tolerate that. She would not stand for it. She would not allow it to happen.

She had considered forcing him to escape with her but knew that his parents would then be punished, maybe even killed, and Draco would not forgive himself that. This was the better choice – __the lesser of two evils __– to have him stay but take away any incriminating memories.

As she had done with her parents, she erased his memories of her in order to keep him safe.

Once she was satisfied she'd performed the spell thoroughly and accurately, she leant over him and gently pressed her lips to his. Tears fell from her eyes onto his cheeks, and it made it look like he'd been crying too.

"I know you won't remember it, but __I__ won't forget, Draco – what you did, how you saved me –" Her voice broke, and she could not say anymore.

She stood, sobs wracking her body uncontrollably, and gave Draco one last look before turning on the spot and Disapparating away.

* * *

Ten minutes later, Draco awakened, confused and groggy, unsure how he'd come to be slumped at the foot of an oak tree on the outskirts of his estate. He shook his head in an attempt to clear it, rose to his feet and walked back to the house.

The only memories he'd have of Hermione Granger being kept a prisoner in the manor would be disjointed and hazy. He would always feel like he was forgetting something important when he thought of her incarceration there.

The snippets he did have fitted neatly into the strengthening narrative of how he made sense of his life up to then: the boy who had been initially seduced by power and then had had no choice but to become cold and ruthless, to continue on the path his father had set out for him.

When he remembered Hermione Granger, though, he would console himself with the fact that, maybe, for her, he'd been the lesser of two evils.

* * *

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